December 2007 Archives

i got tagged by Double Dubs - to my mind the best HR technology and systems blogger around. It's a shame he still has to blog anonymously, but I understand why. Anyway - here goes with 5 things you may not know about be, and certainly won't care ;)

1. I'm a pretty intense Liverpool FC supporter, and one of the best days of my life was being in Istanbul in May 2005 when we came back against AC Milan to win the Champions League trophy (or European Cup to give it its proper name) for the 5th time. Some pictures here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anu/sets/382000/
2. 10 years ago cooking for me involved pressing buttons - either on a phone or on a microwave. Now, after the support and encouragement of my partner, I like to think (in my head) that I'm ok in the kitchen. Come try my lamb..it's tenderlcious :)
3. I went back to India for the first time in 2 decades last Christmas and felt at home. I'm hoping to spend more time there over the next few years.
4. I'm planning to move to Montreal sometime in the next 12 - 18 months. My partner is Quebecois, and she's missing the snow ! Any Canadian social software agencies around ? Get in touch !
5. A true desert involves chocolate. There can be no argument on this :)

Marcel de Ruiter asked "What corporate functions should lead in Enterprise 2.0?'.

I left the following reply:

Having HR lead an Enterprise 2.0 initiative is probably the quickest way to consign it to irrelevance and indifference. HR typically has credibility in HR and benefits – and should be focusing on that. Attraction and retention are bonuses from E2.0 – not the core benefits.

An Enterprise 2.0 initiative (which sounds unwieldy, cumbersome and committee driven, and thus doomed to fail) has to be driven from need and controlled by the people it’s trying to serve – normally those at the sharp end of the business

Now this isn't meant to denigrate HR - but most HR led systems I've seen (when I was at Mercer) are shining examples of bad usability, bad design, and ivory tower mentalities - causing employees to swear under their breath as they use click through flexible benefits systems. (This is true of most corporate driven IT systems).

So, not a good starting point to design something that should be people focused, nimble, adaptable and emergent.

[tags]HR, Enterprise 2.0, corporate, Web2.0, internal[/tags]